Thursday, January 25th 2018

3:33 AM

Daily Reading

Câest bon, mon ami â now you are doing just the thing, Come out, man! No sleeping all life; time is flying. Bravo! That is the way.

Many thanks for your publication. Only, I am afraid it will not pay its way in a pamphlet form. . . . Never mind, pay or no pay â let it see the blaze of daylight. You will have many blessings on you and many more curses â but that is always the way of the world! Sir.

This is the time.

Yours in the Lord,ÂÂ

VIVEKANANDA

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To Swami Brahmananda

(Original in Bengali)

MURREE,

12th October, 1897.

MY DEAR RAKHAL,

Â

I wrote at length in yesterday's letter. I think it desirable to give you special directions about certain matters. . .Â Â

(1) To all those who collect money and send it to the Math . . . the acknowledgment of the amounts will be issued from the Math.

(2) The acknowledgment must be in duplicate, one for the sender, and one for filing in the Math.Â

(3) There must be a big register in which all the names and addresses of the donors will be entered.

(4) Accounts, accurate to the last pie, must be kept of the amounts that are donated to the Math Fund, and fully accurate accounts should be obtained from Sarada and others to whom money is given. For lack of accurate account-keeping . . . see that I am not accused as a cheat. These accounts should afterwards be published.Â

(5) Immediately go and register a will under lawyer's advice to the effect that in case you and I die then Hari and Sharat will succeed to all that there is in our Math.

I have not yet got any news from Ambala, whether Hariprasanna and others have reached there or not. Give the other half-sheet of this letter to Master Mahashay.

Thursday, January 25th 2018

12:05 AM

Daily Reading

To Jagamohanlal

MURREE,

11th October, 1897.

MY DEAR JAGAMOHANL

. . . Leave words when you start for Bombay to somebody to take care of three Sannyasins I am sending to Jaipur. Give them food and good lodging. They will be there till I come. They are fellows â innocent, not learned. They belong to me, and one is my Gurubhâi (brother-disciple). If they like, take them to Khetri where I will come soon. I am travelling now quietly. I will not even lecture much this year. I have no more faith in all this noise and humbug which brings no practical good. I must make a silent attempt to start my institution in Calcutta; for that I am going to visit different centres quietly to collect funds.

Yours with blessings,

VIVEKANANDA

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To Swami Brahmananda

(Original in Bengali)

MURREE,ÂÂ

11th October, 1897.

MY DEAR RAKHAL,

I feel I have been working as if under an irresistible impulse for the last ten days, beginning from Kashmir. It may be either a physical or a mental disease. Now I have come to the conclusion that I am unfit for further work. . . . I now understand that I have been very harsh to all of you. But I knew, however, that you would bear with all my shortcomings; in the Math there is no one else who will do so. I have been increasingly harsh to you. Whatever has happened is now past â it is all the result of past Karma. What is the good of my repentance? I do not believe in it. It is all Karma. Whatever of Mother's work was to be accomplished through me, She made me do, and has now flung me aside breaking down my body and mind. Her will be done!ÂÂ

Now I retire from all this work. In a day or two I shall give up everything and wander out alone; I shall spend the rest of my life quietly in some place or other. Forgive me if you all will, or do what you like.

Mrs. Bull has given much of the money. She has implicit confidence in Sharat. Do the work of the Math with Sharat's advice; or do as you will.

But I have all along been like a hero â I want my work to be quick like lightning, and firm as adamant. Likewise shall I die also. Therefore kindly do my work for me â no question of success or defeat enters here at all. I have never retreated in a fight â shall I now . . . ? There is success and failure in every work. But I am inclined to believe that one who is a coward will be born after death as an insect or a worm, that there is no salvation for a coward even after millions of years of penance. Well, shall I after all be born as a worm? . . . In my eyes this world is mere play â and it will always remain as such. Should one spend six long months brooding over the questions of honour and disgrace, gain and loss pertaining to this? . . . I am a man of action. Simply advice upon advice is being given â this one says this, that one says that; again that man threatens, and this one frightens! This life is not, in my view, such a sweet thing that I would long to live through so much care and caution and fear. Money, life, friends, and relatives, and the love of men and myself â if one wants to enter into work fully assured beforehand of all these â if one has to be so much ridden with fear, then one will get just what Gurudeva used to say, "The crow thinks itself very clever but . . ." (The crow thinks itself very clever, but it cannot help eating filth.) â well, he will get that. After all, what is the purpose behind all these â money and wealth, Maths and institutions, preaching and lecturing? There is only one purpose in the whole of life â education. Otherwise what is the use of men and women, land and wealth?Â

So loss of money, or loss of anything else â I cannot bother about, and I will not. When I fight, I fight with girded loins â that much I fully understand; and I also understand that man, that hero, that god, who says, "Don't care, be fearless. O brave one, here I am by your side!" To such a man-god I offer a million salutations. Their presence purifies the world, they are the saviours of the world. And the others who always wail, "Oh, don't go forward, there is this danger, there is that danger" â those dyspeptics â they always tremble with fear. But through the grace of the Divine Mother my mind is so strong that even the most terrible dyspepsia shall not make me a coward. To cowards what advice shall I offer? â nothing whatsoever have I to say. But this I desire, that I should find shelter at the feet of those brave souls who dared to do great deeds even though they failed to succeed, of those heroes who never quailed nor shirked, of those fighters who never disobeyed orders through fear or pride. I am the child of the Divine Mother, the source of all power and strength. To me, cringing, fawning, whining, degrading inertia and hell are one and the same thing. O Mother of the Universe, O my Gurudeva, who would constantly say, "This is a hero!" â I pray that I may not have to die a coward. This is my prayer, O brother. "

â certainly there is, or there will be born one equal to me"; some one or other will certainly arise from these thousands of devotees of Shri Ramakrishna who will be like me, and who will be able to understand me.

O hero, awake, and dream no more. Death has caught you by the forelock . . . still fear not. What I have never done â fleeing from the battle â well, will that happen today? For fear of defeat shall I retreat from the fight? Defeat is the ornament the hero adorns himself with. What, to acknowledge defeat without fighting! O Mother, Mother! . . . Not one capable of even playing second fiddle and yet the mind filled with petty self-importance, "We understand everything". . . . Now I retire; . . . everything I leave in your control. If Mother sends me men again in whose heart there is courage, in whose hands strength, in whose eyes there is fire, real children of the Mother â if She gives me even one such, then I shall work again, then I shall return. Otherwise, I shall take it that, by Mother's will, this is the end. I am in a tremendous hurry, I want to work at hurricane speed, and I want fearless hearts.

I have rebuked poor Sarada severely. What to do? . . . I do scold; but I also have much to complain. . . . Almost suffocated by short breathing, standing and standing, I have written an article for him. . . . It is all good, otherwise how will renunciation come? . . . Will Mother in the end kill me with attachment? I have offended all of you â do what you want.

I bless you all with a full heart. May Mother enshrine Herself in your hearts as strength:

ÂÂ â the support that is fearlessness â may She make you all fearless. This I have seen in life â he who is over-cautious about himself falls into dangers at every step; he who is afraid of losing honour and respect, gets only disgrace; he who is always afraid of loss always loses. . . . May all good attend you all.